alwang wrote:
Herb, the foliage in that first photo looks good, but the tree trunks look a bit soft to me. Is that a DoF issue, or is that post processing?

Alwang I am not quite sure what you see. To me it looks quite nice. It is within the sharp zone. Maybe because the image can be sharp and almost artifact free. This way it looks smooth and sharply detailed at the same time.
In the same way as large format images look. Or quite close to this.

Jacob D wrote:
Some of these look very good, others (like the latest round of grassy photos) appear to be over-sharpened to my eye.

...

Agree to this. I dont read every post here but I have not seen anything about size reduction. I assume many FM:ers use size reduction in steps. Any of my scripts would definetly ruin an image with some of the presented per-pixel sharpness images seen here. Particularly for grass and other fine details - without necessarily give the usual over-sharpened exaggerated contrast lines and so on. How these guys do it I dont know but I'd like to know. There should be a way to dampen it I assume.

But overall I am impressed and I love new tech coming into the sensor arena. Who knows, it could wake-up the Canon sensor dept which seem to be in deep hibernation mode. Or perhaps it's more like a cryo-sleep.

These shots are amazing. Really. Not just because of the sensor, but because the camera is in some talented hands. Thanks for posting, all.

I have been thinking about the Foveon vs. Bayer thing, and while I think that some of the inherent advantage is certainly the full-color pixels of the Foveon, there are other things to consider.

Over the years, camera manufactures have placed a huge emphasis on high-iso performance. Some would agree that this has happened at the expense of low-iso performance. Weaker CFA's, NR in raw files, etc.

I was looking back at some old 1Ds files, as I just snagged a used one on B&S, and I'm always taken by how sharp the files are...how much detail there is in the 11MP files. But this was back when low-iso was still king.

I don't see anything like the image below out of any of my new cameras. Sure, the higher magnification makes for a lower apparent sharpness, but I do think that most new cams are sacrificing the best possible image quality for better all-round performance. Sigma obviously didn't follow that trend with this series of cameras.

Agree to this. I dont read every post here but I have not seen anything about size reduction. I assume many FM:ers use size reduction in steps. Any of my scripts would definetly ruin an image with some of the presented per-pixel sharpness images seen here. Particularly for grass and other fine details - without necessarily give the usual over-sharpened exaggerated contrast lines and so on. How these guys do it I dont know but I'd like to know. There should be a way to dampen it I assume.

I was thinking exactly the same thing. How to downsize for web posting when the original file is so sharp and needs no additional sharpening to begin with. There is a lot of sharing here about how to process in SPP and LR. Could a kind soul share their flow secrets for downsizing?

BTW, I just purchased a DP2M, shipped directly from Sigma today.
Can't wait to try it out. For my application, it fits perfectly. I pretty much shoot 2 types of photos:
(1) The usual family / vacation type photos, for which I will use my old EPL1.
(2) Hiking, mountain biking or driving home from work are the only other times I get to take pictures. I don't have the luxury of time to dedicate specifically to photography. So, the only time I really get for pictures is when I spontaneously encounter a great scene. But, for those situations, I never have a world class camera with me. That is where the DP2M fits in.

I plan to get a close focus attachment for macro shots, and use stitching for wide angle. I don't shoot much telephoto, but when I do, I plan to use my EPL1 with my 45mm or 90mm Contax-G's, will maybe even pickup a cheap zoom.

Joseph Marney wrote:
There shots are amazing. Really. Not just because of the sensor, but because the camera is in some talented hands. Thanks for posting, all.

I have been thinking about the Foveon vs. Bayer thing, and while I think that some of the inherent advantage is certainly the full-color pixels of the Foveon, there are other things to consider.

Over the years, camera manufactures have placed a huge emphasis on high-iso performance. Some would agree that this has happened at the expense of low-iso performance. Weaker CFA's, NR in raw files, etc.

I was looking back at some old 1Ds files, as I just snagged a used one on B&S, and I'm always taken by how sharp the files are...how much detail there is in the 11MP files. But this was back when low-iso was still king.

I don't see anything like the image below out of any of my new cameras. Sure, the higher magnification makes for a lower apparent sharpness, but I do think that most new cams are sacrificing the best possible image quality for better all-round performance. Sigma obviously didn't follow that trend with this series of cameras....Show more →